Kitt's Cave
in Hammonvale, New Brunswick is a small active limestone
cave with a resurgence and lots of formations that we often
visit. The cave not only has many different formations but
also a variety of different types of passages and problems.
Kitt's Cave is a solution cave in the Windsor Group
limestone of central New Brunswick. The cave is 141 meters
long with eight meters of relief. It is named Kitt's Cave
because it is one of the few known locations where beavers
raise their young deep inside a cave in the spring (3). It
is an active cave with a small stream flowing directly
opposite of the above ground river outside due to the 25
degree dip to the northwest. The cross section of the cave
shows evidence of three different dissolution sequences. The
limestone in the area runs in narrow bands for some distance
with two major bands in the area (5,6). Within these bands
one finds not only Kitt's cave but also other major New
Brunswick caves. These caves include Hamilton Cave, Glebe
Pot,, Golem's Grotto, Dallings Cave, and the Waterford Ice
Caves making it an excellent place to explore.

The current
owners of the cave suggest that the cave has been know since
the road was developed almost a century ago. But modern
exploration of the cave appears to have first been done in
the early 1970's by the Nova Scotia Speleological Society.
Their first map dated April 1974 was published in several
locations. It is shown in the NSSS newsletter which include
the first recorded diving of the sump which took place
Easter Weekend of 1974 when Max Moseley from the NSSS took
20 minutes to dive the sump and come out the other side (6).
The map by Moseley is shown in the NSS Bulletin when the
beaver population of the cave is discussed (3). The map is
again shown in an article on the caves in Canada (7). The
map is now kept in the New Brunswick Provincial Archives in
Saint John, New Brunswick (1). The cave was remapped by the
Caledocadie club in 1989 (1) and is found as part of an Open
Government File. The cave was again mapped with greater
detail and shows up in the Northeastern Caver in as part of
a school field trip report (2). The cave is currently being
used by several caving groups and remains fairly clean of
graffiti.

The cave is
located along the Hammond River just east of Route 111 in
Hammondvale, New Brunswick. The cave is reached after a
short walk along the edge of the owners' property and is
accessed through a sinkhole near the river's edge less than
100 meters from the road. The entrance to the cave is found
in a patch of forest over looking the river where the cave
collapsed under the weight of the glacier forming a 15-foot
deep sinkhole. At the bottom of the sinkhole is a small
opening about one and half feet high and two feet wide that
is the main entrance to the cave.

View Image to see Map

(1) Arseneault, S.P., Schroeder,J., Berube,
D., and Albert,R. 1997. The Caves of Southwestern New
Brunswick. New Brunswick Department of Natural Resources and
Energy Open File 97-7.